Sunday best: Giving thanks

I'm back in Canada just in time for Thanksgiving. I didn't plan it that way, not realizing when I booked my flights when Thanksgiving fell. But it's a lovely synchronicity of festival and feelings, because I'm happy and grateful to be back and for my time away too.

My understanding of how to live this life I've set up for myself, how to handle feeling fragmented, is still very much a work in progress. But every time I return to Toronto I feel like I make another step towards this place, towards seeing it as home. And maybe going away, not just to Ireland but anywhere, is something I need to do more often to cement that understanding.

The holiday was great, full of surprised joy, even the possibility of a dream come true. I wallowed in the company of people I haven't seen in years and left wanting more, wanting to bring them back with me, for them to hold my hand and not let go. It's the hardest part.

And today will be a bit of a lazy, jet-lagged Thanksgiving. I'll spend time catching up, rolling stories around, looking at this city with the veil of familiarity lifted, because it will last just a day or two. And I've already noticed that the sky here is my sea from home. I had missed the height of it after Dublin's low bungalow of sky. So I'll look up and let myself feel at home under this cathedral and I'll be thankful for the vastness of it...